• Meta established a new class of stock to ensure Mark Zuckerberg stayed as CEO.
• The stock class will "continue the founder-led model that has driven the company," Meta said in its third-quarter earnings.
• Zuckerberg has taken a leading position in Meta's AI era.

Meta's board wants Mark Zuckerberg to stick around.

The company announced a new category of non-voting Class C stock in its third-quarter earnings report. It listed several reasons for creating the new class — one of which is to keep the CEO in control.

A Special Committee established by Meta's board determined that Zuckerberg was the best fit to lead the company into its future, and highlighted the CEO's creative vision and management abilities.

"The creation of the Class C common stock will continue the founder-led model that has driven the company's success since its inception," Meta said.

The stock class will also provide Meta the ability to finance its growth, the earnings report said. Meta is spending big on AI and the data centers needed to power it. The company reported $34.91 billion in third-quarter capital expenditures.

Meta's press release said the distribution would effectively amount to a two-for-one stock split for existing shareholders. Susan Li, Meta's chief financial officer, said that the stock will be distributed to existing shareholders.

Other tech companies have issued stock to access new capital without diluting their CEO's voting power. Google performed a stock split in 2012 for a similar reason. Semafor was first to report the new stock class.

Zuckerberg has long been the face of Meta. He's strengthened his leadership through the AI boom, going "startup mode" and getting hands-on with the tech. The company's AI team set up their desks around where Zuckerberg sits.

The success of Muse, Meta's AI agent, has raised the profile of another Meta executive: Alexandr Wang. The chief AI officer has joined Zuckerberg for podcasts and spoken onstage at keynotes.

A Financial Times profile last week touted Wang as a "potential successor to Zuckerberg." It's clear the board wants Zuckerberg there for the long haul.

• Meta's AI agent, Muse, is unprofitable due to "very high compute costs," CEO Mark Zuckerberg says.
• Meanwhile, Meta expects Reality Labs, its AI glasses division, to lose $15 billion next year.
• The social media giant has a plan to fix that.

Meta says some of its biggest cash incinerators could finally start turning profits.

The social media giant, which generated over 97% of its quarterly revenue from ads, has faced persistent questions from investors about the lack of profitability in its AI and hardware initiatives.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg addressed those concerns head-on during its third-quarter earnings call on Wednesday.

Zuckerberg said that Muse, the AI assistant it launched last month, is unprofitable since it's "very compute intensive to run." Meta expects to start turning that around next year by massively improving Muse's efficiency.

"If compute efficiency continues improving quickly for another few years, which we think is highly likely, then Muse will be highly profitable over multiple years," he said.

Meta plans to make money from Muse by taking a small transaction fee off of purchases it drives, Zuckerberg said at Meta's Connect conference last month.

Zuckerberg added that Muse, which launched only in the US and Canada, wasn't launched globally due in part to the amount of compute it requires. (Meta's North American users are generally its most lucrative.)

Zuckerberg also struck a positive note about its cash-hemorrhaging Reality Labs division, which makes products like Meta Ray-Bans and virtual reality glasses.

Meta expects Reality Labs to narrow its losses to about $15 billion in 2027, down from the $18 to $19 billion it expects to lose this year. The division should start trending toward profitability next year, as Meta's AI systems make it more useful, Zuckerberg said.

"I continue to believe that the path to delivering holographic experience, of bringing together the physical and digital worlds and everyday glasses, will come through VR first," Zuckerberg said.

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• Meta spent $34.91 billion in capital expenditures in its third quarter.
• The company is spending big on data centers and other infrastructure for its AI development.
• Meta predicted $135-145 billion in capex for 2026, aligning with analyst expectations.

Meta is making it rain for AI.

The company spent $34.91 billion in capital expenditures during the third quarter of 2026. That's up from the second quarter's sum, $31.08 billion.

For the year 2026, Meta said it expects to spend between $135-145 billion in capital expenditures, narrowed from its prediction of $130-145 billion last quarter.

Meta's forecast includes the yearly capex prediction that analysts expected: $139.79 billion.

As Meta bets big on AI, it is investing heavily in its development. It has built massive, costly data centers and spent big on computing power.

The spending uptick was expected. On the "Cheeky Pint" podcast earlier this month, CEO Mark Zuckerberg recounted early conversations about the investment — and said he'd bet up to $200 billion on AI, before he knew the models would work.

Investors haven't loved Meta's massive capex forecasts in past quarters. The stock tumbled almost 10% last quarter after earnings per share missed Wall Street estimates, and sank 6% the quarter before on raised capex guidance.

This quarter, Meta has a new hero product: Muse.

The AI assistant has reached over 2 million daily users and 3 million downloads. It quickly scaled the App Store. Muse users told Business Insider they chatted with it to help plan trips and ace exams.

The energy around the company is ebullient, as Alexandr Wang, Meta's chief AI officer, continues to post memes of Muse's squishy-looking mascot.

At Meta's Connect keynote event in September, Zuckerberg said Muse "has a novel business model."

"We believe that Muse will make you money, and we're standing behind this by making Muse free for a huge number of tokens with the expectation that over time, we will profit by taking a small fee from transactions," he said.

Muse could help justify the capex guidance for some investors. The stock was trading up 4.12% after-hours at the time of publication.

“Necesitará un barco más grande”. La famosa frase del asombrado Brody al capitán Quint cuando el enorme tiburón blanco hace inesperadamente su aparición en la película de Spielberg por la borda del pesquero Orca viene la cabeza al entrar en la nueva exposición de Cosmocaixa, Tiburones: los guardianes del océano. La muestra, presentada esta mañana en Barcelona, requiere sin duda un barco conceptual más grande del habitual para navegarla, tal es la cantidad de emoción e información que proporciona, incluidas diez reproducciones a tamaño natural de escualos, entre ellos un impresionante tiburón blanco de casi cinco metros, un tigre, un sarda (Carcharhinus leucas), un martillo, un toro (Carcharias taurus ) y un rarísimo y extinto Helicoprion, con una extravagante mandíbula en vertical que parece una sierra circular.

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A Minnesota rapper has stood by his social media posts idolizing the increasingly violent protests in France, which resulted in some 2,500 arrests over the weekend.

Tufawon, whose real name is Rafael Gonzalez Jr., made a series of posts on Facebook advocating for White people in the United States to "go outside and raise hell" after he and Greta Thunberg visited Lycée Paul Éluard, the high school in Saint-Denis where many of the student demonstrations kicked off this month.

"Do I think way more people need to become radicalized here? Absolutely, especially white people, and that’s where I think we can take influence from the French." 

"All Power to the People!" the 40-year-old rapper wrote on Facebook. "Go f— s— up white people. It's your time."

In an earlier post, he clarified that when he says White Americans need to "raise hell" or "f— s— up" about supposed fascism and authoritarianism under the Trump administration, he means they need to "take it to next level peacefully and legally."

RO KHANNA SPARKS BACKLASH OVER FRANCE RIOT COMMENTS AS CRITIC SAYS HE WANTS TO ‘RIDE THE RAGE WAVE’

And in a statement to The New York Post, Tufawon said his Facebook posts "fall under figurative speech and in no way, shape or form did I use them with the intent to incite violence of any kind."

Tufawon, who is part Native American, also told the Post that his participation in some of the French protests last week was impromptu because he had been on vacation in the country.

In one video, he was in front of a crowd chanting "f— ICE" and "ICE out" before performing his song "No One Is Illegal."

The protests in France, which began weeks ago as student-led demonstrations against poor classroom conditions and education funding cuts, have now devolved into widespread riots involving a range of political and ideological factions.

VIOLENCE ERUPTS AT FRANCE PROTESTS AS MACRON WARNS UNREST IS BEING EXPLOITED

Images and videos posted to social media on Saturday and Sunday showed groups of men waving foreign flags while engaging in acts of destruction on the streets of France's major cities.

A Fox News Digital investigation found that communist organizations, Islamic advocacy groups, labor unions and environmental activists were involved in the unrest.

French officials said they have arrested over 2,500 people in connection with the demonstrations, which have drawn participants motivated by a range of issues, including the cost of living and climate change.

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On Saturday, hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets across the country, though looting and violence broke out in Paris, Marseille, Lyon, Bordeaux and other cities.

Shops were broken into, vehicles and buildings were set on fire and in Marseille, the city hall building was set ablaze by agitators. Rioters have so far caused about $1 billion in damage.

President Donald Trump has preemptively sought to discourage similar conduct in the U.S., saying Tuesday that federal law enforcement would treat potential rioters "very, very rough."

More demonstrations are planned across France on Saturday, with French officials planning a massive security deployment ahead of time to deal with expected unrest.

As Washington leans on Ukraine to make a deal with Russia amid its diesel agreement ahead of the US elections, its European partners are meeting to keep it armed against deadly weapons.

President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he met Kongsberg CEO Eirik Lie and Norwegian Defense Minister Tore Sandvik in Oslo on 21 October to discuss more NASAMS air defenses, a day after meeting US presidential envoy Steve Witkoff in the same city.

Washington has spent the past two weeks easing pressure on Russia and leaning on Kyiv, with a diesel deal, throttled Starlink, and talk of cutting intelligence, while Ukraine’s European partners move in the other direction. Russia pounds Ukrainian cities almost nightly, and the Norwegian-made NASAMS is one of the systems holding that barrage off critical infrastructure.

Kongsberg opened an office in Ukraine in 2025. Its NASAMS uses the AIM-120 AMRAAM missile built by the US defense giant RTX, the same firm behind the Patriot launchers that are Ukraine’s only means of downing Russian ballistic and hypersonic missiles. The same missile is also used in F-16s.

“They effectively protect our people and critical infrastructure from Russian missile and drone attacks virtually every day,” Zelenskyy said.

He added that Ukraine is counting on additional defense support packages next month.

A European shield Ukraine wants tested this year

The visit also advanced a joint missile-defense project. Norway is actively involved in FREYJA, a European anti-ballistic missile program that Ukraine is helping to build.

“There are already first results in creating individual elements of the system. Today we determined where we can and must speed up to reach testing by the end of this year,” Zelenskyy said.

FREYJA now draws in 10 countries and is built around an interceptor missile designed to stop ballistic threats, a capability Europe largely lacks against Russia’s fastest weapons.

A push for satellites as Starlink falters

Zelenskyy also raised satellite communications amid the scandal over speed limitations on Elon Musk’s military Starlink service that disrupted a series of front-line missions.

“We discussed in detail the start of work on new satellite-communication capabilities for our soldiers,” the president said, adding that Kyiv would bring in partners able to support them.

The push comes after SpaceX throttled the StarShield military package Ukrainian drones use. Ukraine’s 7th Air Assault Corps said the connection began dropping as drones moved at speed, negatively affecting their missions.

Billionaire former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg hefted $80 million in a final push to help Democrat score big in the 2026 midterm elections.

The post NYT: Billionaire Michael Bloomberg Dumps $80M to Help Democrats Snag House appeared first on Breitbart.

Billionaire ex-mayor of New York City is focusing funds on House races to help Democrats retake majority in midterms

• US politics live – latest updates

The billionaire Michael Bloomberg will spend $80m to help Democratic candidates in the midterm elections, US media reported on Tuesday, a significant infusion of cash for a party that has recently struggled with fundraising as it seeks to win control of Congress.

The reported donations came as Donald Trump announced on Tuesday he intended to spend a total of $400m to aid Republican candidates, with $300m already disbursed.